Religion, Church and the Bible: My Thoughts

Another one of those hot button topics out there. My problem with the religion and church thing is when people try to force their beliefs on me or make me feel bad for not thinking the same way they do. For example, my dad. He's in church pretty much every Sunday and he's always trying to get me to go with him and I probably will eventually but no time soon (and not because I want to, but because he wants me to and I figure it's the least I can do). The thing that bugs me is that when I say no he's all "don't you want to go to heaven?" Really daddy? I love you but calm the fuck down. Sorry but I refuse to believe that not going to church is an automatic ticket to hell. And I don't think I should be made to feel bad for my decision not to go.

In the past I never had a specific reason for not going to church, I just didn't want to. But now I don't want to go because I don't agree with some of the things that are taught in church and I feel that some religious people take the Bible WAY too literally. I personally don't feel that the Bible is something that's meant to be taken word for word. I mean think about it. Look who wrote it and when. A bunch of semi-anonymous old white dudes somewhere in the beginning of time. Do I really want to live my life based on their words? They say it's what God says but how do I know that? How does anyone? Are we just supposed to take their word for it? To an extent I suppose but, I don't know. To be honest, old white dudes haven't always been kind to my people in the past so forgive me if I don't want to heed their advice.

Then there's the whole obedient wife thing I talked about in another post. And of course everyone's favorite topic: homosexuality. On Sunday mornings on BET they show sermons, etc from various preachers, churches and what not. One day I heard a pastor say something about how being gay is wrong, a sin, blah blah blah, bullshit, bullshit, bullshit, yadda yadda yadda. Of course the whole ignorant congregation was in agreement with this fool. At that point I decided I was done with church. If I had to sit there and listen to that idiotic nonsense about how "wrong" homosexuality is I think I might stand up and scream right in the middle of the service. Idiots. One thing I absolutely can not stand is homophobia. It truly pisses me off to no end. I talk about that a little bit here. I just have a serious problem with perpetuating hate and ignorance under the guise of religion. Don't blame your closed mind on God, it's not a good look. Anyway, that's all for now.

ps: I went to Catholic school for 8 years and yes I do believe in God, just not sure about the "institution" of religion (if that makes sense).

The Obedient Wife

A while back a friend of mine on Twitter posted a question about how obedient a wife should be to her husband or something to that effect. I said that I didn't like the idea of obedience in marriage because to me it implies that the woman is subordinate to the husband. I feel like obedience means that she has to listen to him and do what he says, almost like a parent rather than a partner. Then my friend said something about how the Bible says that women are supposed to be obedient to their husbands to some extent or something like that *cough*bullshit*cough*.

After that last comment I just didn't reply because I knew it would probably lead to some type of argument and it wasn't worth it. Needless to say I completely disagree with the idea of a wife (or husband) being obedient to their partner in a marriage. Then the whole Bible aspect just really irked me because I don't believe that the Bible is something that should be taken literally word for word, but that's another issue for another day.

Anyway, like I said before, I think my issue with this is what the word 'obedient' represents to me. Maybe for other people it doesn't seem like such a bad thing but for me it almost seems like lock down. To me obedience sounds like submission, bowing down and being beneath someone which is NOT cool....especially in a relationship. What it basically boils down to is that if I'm in a relationship with someone, there is no reason why I feel I should have to 'obey' them. Last time I checked you weren't my father.

I think I'm ranting. Am I ranting? Anyway whatever, I just can't stand the idea of submissiveness in a romantic relationship. Take that love, honor and 'obey' crap back to the 20's or wherever it came from. Ok fine, keep the love and honor part(you know what I meant).


ps: I really don't like this post but here I am posting it anyway. Ha ha, oh well.